The Republic has been ranked ninth among cities in the region in terms of investment and development prospects for real estate next year. This is according to the latest Emerging Trends in Real Estate Asia Pacific 2015 – a study jointly released by the Urban Land Institute and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
Singapore was ranked seventh a year ago. According to the report, the slip of two notches suggests that Singapore has lost some of its appeal for investors.
It said that Government measures to curb price increases – together with the increasing attractiveness of foreign markets – have resulted in a significant fall in both residential and commercial transactions in Singapore. But PwC said the fundamentals of the real estate sector in Singapore remain strong and attractive.
Meanwhile, the report also showed that Singaporeans continued to invest heavily in overseas properties, particularly in the US, UK, Australia and Japan.
Mr Yeow Chee Keong, Real Estate and Hospitality Leader at PwC Singapore, said: “People with big balance sheets can move out of Singapore and try to invest in other locations and adopt a wait-and-see approach.
“And in terms of the overall cooling measures for Singapore, we hope that we will see a re-calibration, not just the cooling-measure, but in terms of the sellers’ expectations. In real estate, you need to have transactions to keep the market sustainable.”
Source : Channel NewsAsia – 6 Dec 2014